On Friday, we brought you a report of upcoming changes to how Bing works and looks on Windows Phone 8. At the time, we presented a handful of documented alterations and confirmed with Microsoft that these new features were coming to those in the US soon and the rest of the world a bit later.

Today, Microsoft has decided to detail those changes on the Windows Phone Blog, filling in some of the blanks for the search engine overhaul.

Some of those changes include the previously mentioned redesign of Web search, which now merges the Local pivot within it. That’s because Web search has become smarter, allowing it to “…show whatever’s most relevant to your search, including images, videos, and local results”. That’s opposed to the previous method where you’d have to swipe to the right to view different categories.

Such modifications should mean less taps and swipes from consumers, with only relevant information being presented. Similarly, searching for a site like Delta Airlines will now present you with “links to Flight Status, SkyMiles, Track Flight, Flight Schedules”, making things a lot simpler.

Another update is how data is used. On the old Bing, when you brought down results it would also populate the images and video pivots, regardless if you used them or not. Now with the new update, those pivots won’t have data downloaded unless the user swipes to the right, purposefully requesting more information. That should help cut back on some data for users and it is a good move when you consider the earlier re-thinking of the Web search results.

Two other features are Instant Answers and Snapshot. The former we alluded to with the definitions example, whereby Bing will give you a word definition without having to drill into a site to find out more. We have now learned that such Instant Answers include results for local time requests, currency information, traffic data, flight records and more. Meanwhile, Snapshot “provides information at-a-glance about people, places, or things”, without having to load up a website.

All in all, these are nice additions to Bing, though it will be a few weeks before people in the US with a Windows Phone 8 device see these changes (users won’t have to do anything, as the update will come from Microsoft’s servers). We still haven’t had the new experience load up here in New York, but what about you folks? Let us know in comments.

Can you copy a link from the results list? Can you at least share a link from the results list?

Can you copy the link to an image in the image search results?

Bonus: Can I use Bing search INSIDE Internet Explorer?

Because Bing search is such a mess, I have to use Google as my search engine, and I really would like to use Bing; but it's just not possible. Microsoft does not want WP users to use Bing. If it does want it, Microsoft should really fix the shitty Bing Search to AT LEAST MATCH what you can do in the browser (if you could actually browse the website). And, as a bonus, also allow users to search directly INSIDE the browser. JFC!!!!!!

Okay, I took you up on this challenge. I installed Yelp, and for my *very first* search, I searched in Yelp for "Goodyear". Yelp showed me a list of like 14 tire stores in my area, *none* of which had "Goodyear" in the name. Do these other places pay Yelp and Goodyear doesn't? Dunno. Switched over to Bing, searched for Goodyear. Bing found 6 Goodyear repair shops. Advantage: Bing.
Now, I do like the little map button on Yelp that shows me where all the places it found are. Of course, it didn't find what I was looking for, so a map showing all the places I wasn't interested in isn't all that exciting. But the map idea is a good one.
I searched for Panera. Bing found 7 Paneras. Yelp found 2 Panera's and a lot of other non-Panera's. Also, when I select a Panera, Bing shows me something that Yelp doesn't: Store hours. Bing also has "Neighborbood - see what's nearby." I really like that.
Also, Bing search lets me go to Apps, where I can pick Yelp if I want. Does Yelp offer to take me to Bing? I think not.
Conclusion: Bing rules, Yelp drools.

Conclusion - You didn't truly understand what my point was. I was referring only to Local Scout..more precisely Local Scout's ability to find and list restaurants nearby. Since you devoted a lot of time to the actual Bing 'Search' which wasn't what my point of contention was, I'll focus on the See what's nearby, Eat and Drink feature of Local Scout which is what I think is lacking.
Both the Nearby and Hot and New Nearby tabs in the Yelp app return far numerous and up to date results than what I get for Local Scout. And maybe you missed it, but the store/restaurant hours are listed along with the ability to launch Maps for directions.
So, this is not about Search. Just Local Scout.

Ahh, okay, fair point, I was conflating Bing Search and Local Scout. Frankly, I don't use Local Scout much. I went back to Yelp and tapped "Nearby", and it gave me a bunch of different categories to choose from. I would definitely use this more than Local Scout. What would be nice is if the "Nearby" tile could be "deep pinned" to the Start screen, so I could get to Yelp's Nearby with one tap from Start.

Sure, but world largest smartphone market is China. Also as Lumia sales dominate over 80% of WP, Nokia's quarterly revenue is second smallest in NA, comes after Africa. Asia is 4 times more and Europe is 5 times more.

Future of smartphones is in China and EU is the largest smartphone market.

Much fewer WP users than those that live outside of the US. To make things worse they cripple Bing outside of the US (even here, in Canada, where stepping over the border makes a large difference in search functionality) and make it an indecent alternative to Google.

No unfortunately all of this will be US only as most often is the case with Bing. Here in Europe we have no Bing Rewards, no Local Scout and all of the mentioned changes to the search engine are not even planned here.

That's the problem with Microsoft. They concentrate 150% on their home market when in fact outside of it they have way more sales. But looking at it this way is probably deemed unpatriotic and therefore not possible in an American firm.

Now that's what i call innovative stuff. It isn't a reason to ignore the much desired basic essentials though, which everyone has talked about and i am seriously tired of mentioning them again and again. Still, Microsoft is doing a fairly good job.

Not sure why anybody would be upset that I want an extra feature to be able to disable the button, wouldn't affect anyone except those that wanted to disable it and would make the phone even more customizable to a user's needs. Isn't part of the 'Windows Phone' experience supposed to be how personal the phone is and able to be tailored to my specific needs/wants?

I noticed this yesterday, wasn't getting weather instant answer like I usually do, and there were fewer tabs. I think Bing is the biggest investment for WP because of instant answers like this or finding things quick. Can't wait for more of the updates to come in. One thing that I noticed from Windows Phone 7 to 8 is that city location doesn't come up as an instant answer.

it actually is search term dependent. i did the bingiton challenge multiple times on the website, and Bing had roughly a 75% win rate. Some search terms work better in Google than others, and it all depends on who you as a person search for in the first place. Bing also seems to do the "did you mean [CORRECTED TERM]?","Including results for [CORRECTED TERM]", and "Searching for [CORRECTED TERM]" things a bit TOO proactively, sometimes including and searching for corrected results when you never misspelled or entered your original search term incorrectly in the first place.

Not good. I used to be able to force local search before. Bing is not good enough to recognize certain mismatches. For example, in Tampa, it recognizes Tampa International Airport and gives me directions but if I say Tampa Airport, I just get web results. This is going to be a bit of a painful transition. I thought the local search was one of the best implemented search results. Boy, I am going to miss it. Also, I do think google has better search results comparatively for local contexts but I hate Google. Change is sometimes for the better - I hope so in this case but lets see how it works going forward.

OK after some intial testing the "local" results only show up for major cities. I put in "restaurants in washington DC" and I get the map and a few business listings.

I put in suburbs of washington DC (reston, va or alexandria, va) and I don't get the map or business listings. WTF!

I always started with Bind search when I need to find a POI instead of going directly into a GPS/mapping app. Can't do that if local results are only provided for some cites and not all. This must be how our oversea's friends fee.
So looks like MS borked the "Local" functionality or it's only half there and the rest of the US cities are coming later????

OK after some intial testing the "local" results only show up for major cities. I put in "restaurants in washington DC" and I get the map and a few business listings.

I put in suburbs of washington DC (reston, va or alexandria, va) and I don't get the map or business listings. WTF!

I always started with Bing search when I needed to find a POI instead of going directly into a GPS/mapping app. Can't do that if local results are only provided for some cites and not all. This must be how our oversea's friends feel.
So looks like MS borked the "Local" functionality or it's only half there and the rest of the US cities are coming later????

I used the update over the weekend, while travelling, and noticed the same thing. The local search is now a fraction of its former functionality. I was in Miami and couldn't even use Bing to find a sushi restaurant. It's just pretty much useless now for local searching.

While I like most of the changes, I do miss the map feature of the local section. If I wanted to check the hours of a business, it was nice to be able to pull up the info without going into a website. Now I have to go to a website a do a search on the companies page for there local stores and so forth. The only work around I have found is to just do the search in the map app which isn't bad, just takes away the simplicity the search key.

Ok now I have played with it a little more and have had more luck with searching for something with my city included in the search(gas in Spokane). Hopefully when the whole thing is done I won't have to type in my location to get local results to pull first.

I hope MS update the bing panaroma feature to work outside the US - if you press the search button you get a single search page however if you change the browser search options to US (no restart needed) it will enable the panaroma feature.
That was a killer feature for me, to have the ability to search for movies, get directions and times without the need for an app. Also this oddly enables sort by distance and opening times in local scout... which also disabled. However I'm content with this work around but some people will not be.
So right now I'm using the Cineworld app (hooray for third part devs!) it works a treat and is always constantly updated to boot.

Wonder if MS is updating this for the Netherlands and IF IT WORKS the way it should. Cause the regular Bing service sucks big time here. I love MS, but here they do little effort for us WP fans :( And don't get me started on WP (or Windows 8/Surface) commercials. Or rather lack thereof...

Would have been great if tell me or what ever that voice / speech thing is called in windows phone 8 is seriously improved. Look at google now they caught up to Siri and are even better than Siri in some cases.

I am not getting any local search results like appear in the 5th photo of this article ("restaurants in seattle"). Now that the Local Pivot is gone and there are no local results returned, Bing for WP8 forces me to click on the website of the business I am hunting for. Does anyone know why I receive no local listings on my Web Pivot? It appears that MS has screwed this up, at least in my case.

Stop the BS PR on taking Local search off Bing Mobile as a "GOOD THING"

Please tell the turth about Microsoft and AT&T and help us get back LOCAL search on Bing Mobile. It works great in the USA. Yes it takes up more time and Meg to download...?? But who cares?
Why would any one think taking off LOCAL, or SHOPPING was a good idea on a Phone Search? How do you find Phone #'s now?
Did it go bye bye, for the same reason AT&T forced Microsoft to take of tethering years ago? These features were the best on my PHONE and made Microsoft and Bing Mobile better than all others even...Bing, Google and Yahoo.
Think how you use a phone search engine .... isn't to find phone numbers, most of all?
So how do you get a phone # now? Or find a local restaurant, store and businessvwith your built -in GPS. Try to find a restaurant's phone number, now on your Bing Mobile today! Worse... try to call it.
Now I have to use Microsoft Mobile Map APP.

You'll see again how Microsoft took 3 steps backward to end up more steps behind the competition in phone..